- Popstar Liam Payne has said he listened to Robbie Williams pretty much 24/7 as a youngster
- The former One Directioner said he modelled his own sound on Robbie Williams and Eminem (Marshall Mathers)
- Payne places his own sound “somewhere in-between the two”
- The popstar said both artists were ‘idols’ to him, in an exclusive interview with Esquire Middle East
Liam Payne has said as a youngster he listened to Robbie Williams non-stop, and that the first ever CD albums he ever bought with his own money was an Eminem record.
The ex-One Direction star went on to say that he modelled his own sound “somewhere in-between the two”.
The popstar was speaking about his music icons as part of an exclusive interview with Esquire Middle East (he is on the cover of the June 2019 issue).
The intersection of pop and rap is well-reflected in Payne’s solo career so far. His debut single, ‘Strip That Down Migos alum Quavo, and went on to be certified platinum in both the US and UK markets.
The title track of his First Time EP also saw Payne team-up with rapper French Montana.
Recently, Payne has had to transition from squeaky-clean One Direction boyband member to a fully-fledged solo artist (which is no easy feat).
Payne’s certainly not the first popstar to align themselves with a more urban sound in an attempt to appeal to an older demographic. Nor will he be the last.
“When we did the band stuff it was very—not exactly scripted—but let’s just say you kind of knew your audience very well,” says Payne. “We’d usually sell a tour out before we’d even done an album.
“And then they [the record producers] would go: ‘Right, you’re doing stadiums’. And then you’d go: ‘Okay, so we need longer choruses—the kind of songs that people can chant in a stadium’. You had to kind of write around the tour.”
You can read the full Liam Payne story right here.
